SYMBOLIC

Symbolic is one fine death metal album if I ever heard one. Still, 6 albums into their discography I'm totally clueless as to why this band is associated with progressive death metal. Maybe the one remaining album will shed a light on that matter?

Death sure brought their best songwriting and hardest hitting intensity ever into play here. Symbolic is an amazing death metal album. It's competent, technical, gripping, aggressive and inspired, but it does little or nothing to be more then just that, a genre-record. It conforms too much to all old-school death traditions and rules, guaranteed to please all fans of the style.

Granted, Death created much of those rules themselves and they are entirely welcome to perfect their own style, but I'm lacking that little extra that would make one song distinguishable from the next. The vocals are ripping and emotive, but remain the same through all songs. The same goes for the riffing, excellent throughout but too little diversity in phrasing and structure to make the songs memorable. Maybe I'll need some more years with this album to distinguish one riff from the other. Which will be quite the task given this album must have about 300 of them.

Rather harsh words for an album that I really enjoy, they are not meant as a punishment for not being Prog, it's just that I find some other albums in the Tech/Extreme Prog Metal more diverse and engaging. Of course this is an excellent Death Metal album.